What needed to happen next played out in Hiro’s mind’s eye. He would slide the rooftop patio door open, hurtle his Buster Kunai at the winged monster, kill it (hopefully), or be prepared to slam the door shut, turn, and run for his life.

Hiro checked his phone to see the time:

02:13:09:49

02:13:08:48

02:13:07:47

He seemed to keep checking his phone at hour intervals. It was stressful. It reminded Hiro of what it had been like when he worked for the delivery service. A different kind of torture.

Maybe there is something fun about this after all...

The grin on Hiro’s face was one of shame.

Then, it was one of pleasure as he crept to the sliding glass door, which was covered by drapes.

Before he moved on the winged monster, Hiro silently practiced his throw.

What’s the best way to kill this damn thing? He looked at his hand as if it didn’t belong to him. Should I throw it like this? Will it laugh at my mask, giving me a better chance to kill it?

A year ago, Hiro would have pulled out his phone again and watched a YouTube video on how to throw a knife.

Now, no such luck.

As crazy as it would be to fly out onto the rooftop and spear the winged monstrosity, Hiro decided to go with the option that would leave the least amount of room for a misstep.

To anyone watching, it would look a bit comical. But to Hiro, it made sense: Yank the door open, charge out, overhand tossed the kunai into the beast, and prepare to {Bounce} out of the way if necessary.

“Do it,” Hiro said, psyching himself up. “Do it.” He swung the door open and tossed the Buster Kunai.

Fwitt!

His blade morphed to its full size midair and stabbed right into the shoulder of the enormous bird. Hiro stumbled backward at the sight of the creature, which was a sick amalgamation of a pterodactyl, a dragon, and a sinewy raven, its talons big enough to rip Hiro in half.

Instead of lunging for him, the startled raven monster screeched and jumped off the roof.

“Shit, shit, shit!” Hiro ran to the edge of the roof to find that the creature hadn’t actually landed in the streets below. Instead, it tore through the glass outer wall of another building, several stories down. It was still alive, flapping its wings and screeching madly.

It wasn’t a hunter, it wasn’t a Sentry. Was it just another random monster? Are they really that big? How am I going to get into that window?

Another thought came to him, one that had him shaking his head.

Could I time a jump correctly?

Maybe there was a chance in a videogame that Hiro would be able to do something like this. If not, he would be able to practice it again and again until the muscle memory was so perfect that he would make it through the glass.

But this was the real world.

Even if he had recently fought a stone priestess the size of a totem pole, or used a Japanese throwing dagger that morphed into a buster sword to take down a creature that shouldn’t exist—he wasn’t about to make that jump.

But then Hiro spotted some people in the streets below, a pair of Survivors that hadn’t seen him yet. They managed to get the door open of the building in question and charge inside, ready to claim his kill.

I guess I’m going to have to fast-track this.

It didn’t seem like it was possible, and if it didn’t work out, Hiro would simply go through another window. As stupid as that sounded.

There was no time to gather nerves. Hiro had to go.

Hit the streets, bounce up to the window. Hit the streets, bounce up to the window…

He gulped and threw himself to the streets below, where he bounced, and flailed his arms above him in hopes of reaching the monster.

Hiro hit his mark, both feet on the ground, all of his nerves firing at once as landed in the office building. He looked ahead into a scattering of cubicles, the raven-monster beating one wing as it tried to use its beak to pull the blade out.

Hiro used {Blade Whirlwind} as the winged creature spilled forward, its body crushing keyboards and computer monitors.

The amalgamation slammed its beak into the ground and pulled itself forward, madness in its bloodshot eyes.

Hiro hit the creature with his attack several more times, blood and blackened feathers spritzing the air. He stood his ground, slashing at the winged monstrosity again and again until it finally fell.

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“Fuck you,” Hiro whispered as he Soul Essence poured into him.

He approached the carcass and placed his hand on the grip of his Buster Kunai. The throwing knife that could turn into an impossibly large sword instantly shrank.

Hiro was just putting it away in his pocket when he heard the sound of footsteps.

A man and a woman exploded into the office to find Hiro standing there with his katana drawn, his crazed black mask over his face. The image startled the pair, who both jumped back upon seeing him.

“Wh-who are you?” the man asked, his voice trembling.

In any other year, the guy would be the kind of person Hiro would expect to see in the Financial District in a fleece vest over a light blue dress shirt, maybe a red tie, dark gray khakis, and a paycheck that Hiro could have only dreamed about.

Now, this man was a Survivor just like him. The Doom System may have been an asshole, but it was also a great equalizer.

“I am not the main character.” Hiro pointed his blade at the man. “You?”

“Nah, bro, I’m not the main character. Fuck the Doom System.”

“You?” Hiro asked the woman, who had frizzy hair and glasses held together by duct tape.

“Eff that. We just… we just thought we could get an easy kill.”

Hiro lowered his blade. “Sorry. It’s dark in here, and we always have to be careful. Two against one if you decide to try something.”

“We don’t want to try anything,” the woman assured him. “See? No weapon.” She dropped her knife and showed him the palm of her hands.

“Beth!” the man hissed at her.

“Sorry. That was stupid of me!”

She has powers, and she has a Roulette Skill, Hiro reminded himself as he kept the tip of his blade pointed at the ground, aware that he would be able to draw it at any moment.

“Drop your weapon, Craig,” the woman told her companion. “Just do it.”

“Wait, really?”

“Just do it.” She hit him lightly. “Do it, Craig.”

“Ugh. Fine.” Craig dropped a baton that resembled something a police officer would carry. “See?” he told Hiro. “Everything is good. Are you from around here?”

“Not really.”

“We lived in SoHo before all this,” the man said. “I’m Craig, she’s Beth.”

Hiro acknowledged this with a grunt. “Why didn’t you take a power?”

“When the gates were giving out powers? Nah, it just seemed sort of strange to me, you know,” Craig said. “I thought about it. But it seemed too good to be true, and then everything else happened. The one that really got me was the religious figures. Well, it didn’t get me, I knew it was bullshit.”

Hiro nodded. That had been a disaster. The gates had introduced all of the most famous religious figures back into the world, which turned out just as horribly as anyone could imagine. Hiro heard it was especially rough in places like India, where there was a large pantheon, all with their own viewpoints.

But it was bad in the West as well.

“People shouldn’t meet who they deem to be their creators,” Beth said. “Sort of that old story of not meeting your hero, you know?”

“But it was all fake,” Craig reminded her. “None of it was real. Even if it seems real, even if it looks real, it’s not. It’s the Doom System, and it’s bullshit. I don’t get what the gates are trying to do anyway. Giving us powers, gods and goddesses, taking away our weapons, screwing with our bank accounts, ruining us financially, then killing everyone with a superpower and forcing us into this game. I’m missing a few things there, but you know what I mean. And now, this.”

“What do you think it is?” the woman asked Hiro. “These gates, the Doom System, all of it, what do you think it’s trying to do?”

“I think it told us exactly what it is trying to do. It’s trying to entertain us, or it thinks it is,” Hiro said. “The Doom System thinks it’s helping us. Same with all the other things that it did.”

Craig wiped his nose with his sleeve. “You think it’s alien?”

“Anything that we don’t understand is alien,” Hiro said.

This wasn’t his quote.

It was something his dad once told when he asked them if the US government actually had things like UFOs. He knew his father once had security clearance. But his dad never elaborated on what he could have possibly seen aside from that quote of his.

“You go through stages with these goddamn gates,” Craig said with disdain. “You hate it, you get used to it, and then things settle down for a while and everyone accepts it. But this is different this time. Everyone with a superpower is dead, and all of us are forced to compete in some epic video game. That’s what it feels like. All the stupid stats.”

Hiro had been on the verge of inviting Craig and Beth to his gate, but the statement made him glad he hadn’t had the chance to mention it yet.

I don’t know what will happen next, but I’m not ready to throw in the towel.

And as he looked the pair over again, it seemed like they were on the verge.

There was desperation in their eyes, and the way they dropped their weapons showed how willing they were to give up. Beth was right. It had been incredibly stupid to toss their weapons down, even if they had insane Roulette Skills.

“It was nice to meet both of you,” Hiro finally said after the conversation died down.

“Nice to meet you, too,” Craig told him. If he was disappointed that their encounter wouldn’t go on for longer, he didn’t show it. The man merely looked at Beth and shrugged.

“A final question, if you don’t mind.”

“Sure,” Beth told Hiro.

“A woman in a yellow raincoat and a red umbrella. Have you seen anyone like that?”

The two exchanged glances. Beth spoke, but she did so while she was still looking at Craig, not Hiro, which told him something. “I don’t think I’ve seen anyone like that.”

“Right. Well, when you do, tell her I am looking for her.”

“And your name?” Beth laughed nervously. “Sort of a weird way to leave a message, but if we do ever see someone like that, I suppose we could tell them something.”

“The man in the black mask. She’ll know who I am. A word of advice: if you do see her, maybe don’t tell her anything if she gets too close. Maybe, you run. She tried to have me killed, you know.”

“We’re sorry to hear that,” Craig said carefully.

****

Hiro arrived at the food bank near the river. From his current vantage point, he could see the bridge that connected over to Long Island, the water sparking, not a soul in sight.

Or so it seemed.

Across the cityscape, thousands of stories like his were being played out. There were Hunters, monsters, Sentries, and Survivors.

It was mayhem.

The system was fucked.

And weirdly enough, Hiro was starting to enjoy it.

No one’s there, he thought as he looked down at the food bank. There could be supplies, but they’ve probably all been looted by now…

Hiro considered his options and decided it was time to head back.

Home it is. He turned toward the Financial District, toward his fallout shelter and the parking garage. And it’s time to deal with the two horned tigers…